The Island
Lincoln Six Echo (Ewan McGregor), like the rest of the fellow population, lives life in a utopia where food, shelter, and interaction take place in a controlled environment away from the great devastation that contaminated the earth years ago. Everyone's goal is to gain entry to the island, the only place left in the world that is not contaminated, by winning the lottery. But as time goes on, Lincoln begins to question his surroundings as he interacts with a technician (Steve Buscemi) and begins to have visions in his nightmares. Dr. Merrick (Sean Bean) and his friends try to bring him back to reality, but human curiosity leads him to follow a flying insect and eventually the truth behind the utopia they live in. Soon, he takes his friend, Jordan Two Delta (Scarlett Johansson) and breaks out. Dr. Merrick, in an effort to keep things quiet, hires Albert Laurent (Djimon Honsou) and his team to capture them before the truth is spread throughout the world.

As you know, Michael Bay's films are meant to stimulate the visual senses and not the mental ones. The Island continues this streak with the requisite car chase that blows everything up and cool gadgets everyone needs to use. But honestly, if you look past the various plot holes, the questions left unanswered, the ways Lincoln and Jordan get out of various situations and the unintentionally funny ending, this is a film you can certainly enjoy. I was a little bothered by the increasing amount of product placement in the film, something done to blunt the cost overruns. This could have been done a bit more discreetly. Also, the learning curve for Lincoln and Jordan progresses too fast to be plausible since they've learned only simple communication and simple tasks in the compound but by the end, Lincoln has mastered flying, driving, and Scottish slang while Jordan is able to shoot guns with amazing accuracy and leads a rescue of her friends. In the hands of a more serious director, the ethical questions of cloning would have made for a better movie, but in the hands of Bay, you've got to leave some room for the imagination to enjoy the pair's journey to truth, romance, and reality, and back again. 2.5 stars